The Rust Maiden

Created on: 7/10, 2010 at 02:41 pm

This was for a terrific swap hosted by Candycore. I love her Risk series. The premise is that you don't know what you're signing up for. You have to make whatever kind of ATC your partner asks for. My partner, Rustycage11, who lives over in England and is a mighty decent artist herself, asked for... wait for it... Rust!

So rust she got. I'd heard about this rust dying technique from one of the girls over at Gail's Coolabberation 2009. What you do is take a cotton or silk cloth, wrap it around something good and rusty, put it in a baggy, saturate it with vinegar, and put it somewhere warm. I put mine on top of my clothes dryer.

Check it the next day, 'cause it goes quick! Stop the process by rinsing the fabric and rubbing through a paste of baking soda. Let dry.

The next day, I had this interesting image.

To finish the ATC, I sewed around randomly with verigated thread, painted on some circles and pasted on some gems. Ta-da! I think it looks like a resting woman who is wearing an old roman-style helmet.

---

Persia Sails Into Port

Created on: 6/26, 2010 at 10:49 pm

This is the doll I mailed out for Gail's Coolabberation Round Robin 2009 last year. Wow. She is amazing. This isn't even any of her stuff! Her ship has an amazing sail that goes with it, but I was running (as usual) and just scooped up the doll and the ship, which completely blows me away! Enjoy!

---

Scream Like a Girl

Created on: 5/4, 2010 at 08:59 pm

You ever have one of those serendipitous moments that makes you so damn happy you could squeak? Over at Swap-bot, you have a lot of leeway when it coems to looking at artist profiles. If you've left a comment, someone can click on your name and read all about you. Or at least as much about you as you wrote down for public consumption.

I was surfing around, reading profiles and comments, following my nose to whatever was interesting when I found this guy. Go look. I'll wait. It's totally worth it.

Now, you may know that I'm a sucker for copper and brass. I love it. I love to work with both and I know they're fantastic mediums for the artist. However, most of what I do in copper and brass is wire- wrapped, woven, twisted and hammered. In fact, when I named this blog, I was doing a whole lot of it. And it was mostly twisted, heh.

I know how much time and effort goes into making metal do what you want. You have to make friends with it. You can't be pushy like you can with wool roving. You can't be slippery like you can be with clay. You can't force it like you can with yarn and floss. You have to befriend the metal or it will turn its back on you every damn time. You can tell Jerry Ringling has made friends. His images sing.

Anyway, so there I am, drooling over his knotwork and his octopi and his ravens and the tiny little bee, completely impressed by the detail that flows onto the medium. I'm thinking to myself, "I wonder how long it would take to get randomly assigned to him so I can get something of his in a swap?" I mean really, his work blows me away.

My wishing was worth it. I got him in a draw this week.

The first thing I did was embarrass myself with an email wherein my heart was on my sleeve and I did everything but ask him to sign my t-shirt, but I believe that if you like someone's art, you're obliged to mention it. Lotta work goes into it. Not to mention that, often, an artist's toughest critic is themselves. I know I'm that way.

But it turns out that it's not just my lucky week to get one thing, I get to have three! We've been cracking the emails, he and I, and it turns out he likes my work too! Barters are being planned. Which is why y'all get to see the prototype chain maille bracelet Husband made for me.

This is one of the things on the table for barter. Mine is very simple. It's got a lobster claw closure (cause I'm mean on bracelets) and no decoration (because my mom's beads just came this week). Future bracelets will have a gorgeous toggle closure (picked 'em myself) and will have a bead (or two) hanging from the three points.

The beads are handmade by my wonderful mum, who is a deft hand at lampwork.

She got invited to come teach classes at the Jackson Hole Art Association this week after someone involved saw her things at a show. I'm excited to see where that goes for her.

Anyways, in case you're drooling over Jerry's stuff as much as I am, you can find him over at Etsy with even more good stuff. If you want something unique, he's your man.

---

Spiderman... Kinda

Created on: 5/4, 2010 at 08:21 pm

This ATC went to untitledpainting in a Spirited Away swap hosted by marilavado. I wanted to make one of No Face, but I couldn't find an image I liked to draw from. Kamijii is my favorite character anyway. I love how he's all "I'm a big mean bastard and I don't have time for you" but when Chihiro needs him most, he comes through for her.

---

Weekend Update With Your Host... Emthe

Created on: 4/30, 2010 at 11:56 pm

Green and Black ATC hosted by gilman. This one went to Fritosmom who loves all things Chihuahua. The parameters stated it had to be green and black only... hope shades of gray count 'cause I only dipped into two colors! I'm happy with this one. He looks so goofy!

I'm digging zentangles. This one and the one I posted previously went to foxybeth in Black & White Zentangle ATC hosted by PunkerGirl

So, I did something stupid. I misread some swap instructions last month. It said 4 ATCs to 1 partner. I thought it was a 1 for 1 and sent my card during the first week. My partner, ghostlysun, was incredibly cool about it with a PM letting me know my mistake. This card and the next 2 are part of the Junk Mail ATC hosted by rhonnifer. I spent hours ripping up a credit card offer and gluing the wee bitty pieces back on. I like the random tile background effect.

I'm turning into an ATC snob. The more I get into them, the more poring through magazines for cool collage stuff isn't enough. This is one exception where I found just what I was looking for. The rules said you had to use your junk mail as the majority of the work but that you could add paint, ink, glitter, etc. This card didn't need any.

I loved making this one! The bottom layer is a dude in his pool. (An ad for relaxing, I have no idea what the product was.) Second layer is stippling starting with red and working up to light aqua in acrylic. Third layer is a cat face I cut out of an add for an art show. The end product was so freaky that the words I found in a cruise flyer worked perfectly. Something for Everyone... sorta. If you like cat gods.

This one went to Jananini, who lives on Mint Leaves Avenue (love it!) in April:Sender's Choice hosted by KatarinaNavane. Sender's choice, eh? So I played with portraits. I have a hard time drawing good faces from my mind's eye. Much better when I'm sketching from a model. So this I did along with a tutorial posted on youtube. Interesting face, I like the way the nose came out, but I'd like to follow the tute again and do it exactly the way they're showing. I got bored halfway through the video and started winging it. I haven't posted Camille's journal yet, but when I do, you'll recognize the hair.

This is from the What's In Your Purse Swap hosted by kawaiibuttons. You can click here to read the play-by of what all the stuff is.

---

- More Twisted blogs -
:: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 Next ::